J.A. Happ has been a model of consistency for the Blue Jays this season.
His streak of superb starts came to a sudden end against the Tampa Bay Rays.
Curt Casali hit a three-run home run, Tim Beckham and Steve Pearce each hit two-run blasts and the Rays had four homers while beating Happ and Toronto 13-2 on Monday night.
Photo: AFP
Happ (5-1) entered as one of six undefeated big league starters, but matched a career worst by allowing eight runs and seven hits in two innings.
“I just didn’t execute,” Happ said. “It got away from me quick.”
It was the first time in eight starts this season that the left-hander had allowed more than three earned runs, and the first time he had failed to pitch at least six innings.
Photo: AFP
“He’s human, you know? He’s been so good, he’s been on such a nice little run. Chuck it out, move on,” manager John Gibbons said.
Happ’s woeful outing snapped a streak of 19 straight games in which Blue Jays starters worked at least six innings.
Happ blamed his struggles on an inability to locate his two-seam fastball.
“It was cutting on me instead of fading or sinking,” Happ said. “Then I tried to feel for it a little bit and that’s always a mistake. You’ve got to be aggressive with everything.”
Gibbons was ejected by home plate umpire Mike Winters for arguing a called third strike in the fourth.
It was the third ejection of the season for Gibbons and his second in two games — he was one of eight tossed in a game on Sunday against Texas that included Rougned Odor’s punch to the jaw of Jose Bautista. Toronto have lost three straight.
Desmond Jennings also homered, as the Rays set season highs in runs and hits (17).
“Just a great offensive outpouring by everybody,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “A lot of balls were hit with authority.”
Jennings and Steven Souza Jr each had three hits in the opener of an eight-game, three-city trip.
Drew Smyly (2-4) allowed one run and four hits in five innings to win for the first time in four starts.
Staked to a 2-0 lead on Pearce’s first-inning homer, Smyly nearly gave it back in the bottom half by walking the bases loaded with two-outs, throwing 10 straight balls at one stretch.
Smyly escaped the first by striking out Troy Tulowitzki on a 2-2 fastball.
Steve Geltz, Ryan Webb, Dana Eveland and Enny Romero each worked one inning for Tampa Bay.
Pearce connected off Happ in the first for his sixth. After Kevin Kiermaier’s sacrifice fly, Beckham made it 6-0 with a one-out drive in the second, his first.
Souza chased Happ with an RBI single in the third and right-hander Dustin Antolin came on for his Major League debut. After Jennings lined out to third, Casali drilled a three-run homer, his fifth.
Jennings, who came in zero for his past nine, made it 11-0 with a two-out, two-run double off Antolin in the fourth and then capped it with a leadoff blast off Jesse Chavez in the ninth.
In other results, it was:
‧ Marlins 5, Phillies 3
‧ Tigers 10, Twins 8
‧ Pirates 8, Braves 5
‧ Indians 15, Reds 6
‧ Diamondbacks 12, Yankees 2
‧ Athletics 3, Rangers 1
‧ Angels 7, Dodgers 6
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier